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Two new studies highlight how communication gaps can complicate efforts to protect vulnerable users of technologies such as social media and AI chatbots. Researchers will present the work at the 29th ACM Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW 2026), held Oct. 1–14 in Salt Lake City.

One study—coming amid a swirl of lawsuits over the negative impacts of social media on youth—reveals ways platforms have fallen short in communicating about social media risks to children. The work is published on the arXiv preprint server.

"Social media companies are under enormous scrutiny right now over their impact on children, but an important part of that conversation is whether families and policymakers can actually understand what protections platforms are providing and whether those protections work," said Pamela Wisniewski, principal research scientist and leader of the Socio-Technical Interaction Research Group at the International Computer Science Institute.

"Our research shows that safety communications can often be selective, vague and difficult to verify. If we want meaningful accountability, platforms need to communicate much more transparently about what their safety features do, who has access to them and what evidence exists that they are effective."

A second study examines a different but increasingly important question: What happens when people begin relying on AI to help navigate some of life's most difficult and consequential situations? The researchers compared how chatbots, clinicians and peer caregivers responded to real questions from people caring for someone with Alzheimer's disease.

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